tale_of_zulfandomcom-20200213-history
Koneland
Koneland, also known as Goreynia, and as Goreland, is a nation of Sphenklavian peoples in the Kobeyerlands of Western Parthalenn collectively known as the Gores, or amongst themselves as the ''Klyny'' ("Gores"), made up of several 'tribes,' including: the Moregores, Lovegores (disparagingly known as the Whoregores), Blackgores, Orkgores, Smokegores, and Truegores. In the Konelander tongue (which is, in truth, a series of separate, mostly unintelligible dialects), these tribes are known simply as klany (clans), and their members as klansmeșșny (clansmen, clan members). These clans, respectively, go by the Konelander names Muyurmeșșny ("Wallmen"), Miloșmeșșny ''("Mercifulmen"), ''Czarnymeșșny ''("Blackmen"), ''Ogromnsyny ("Giantsons"), Smoksyny ("Dragonsons"), and Mædry ''("the Wise"). Seen by the outside world as godless barbarians, in reality most Konelanders are mere serfs who grow purple potatoes on the land of their local goodlord. Lordly families make up the leadership of most clans, and male serfs are conscripted into their forces. Perhaps 3% of Konelanders ever see battle or go on raids. Geography: Koneland is a vast grassy country occasionally interrupted with cliff faces, statues of nameless gods, low rolling hills, small streams and ponds, and temperate woodlands all contained within a great valley surrounding the River Goreson (Korzenie rzeki, "River Roots," sometimes jokingly called ''klynsyn, "goreson"), which was historically known simply as the River Kortz. The country is landlocked, bordered by temperate rainforests to the west, the Tonik Taiga to the south, the Kobey Desert to the east, and the infamous Ymetran Wall to the north. The country is nearly always foggy, and it is said that evil woods wytches cast down clouds from the Vrankish Alps beyond the Wyrmwood Forest. It rains only occasionally, and never very hard. Hot Seasons are mild, and Cold Seasons are hard. The land is blanketed in snow during the Cold Season, and it becomes impossible to grow anything. Many villages are abandoned in favor of towns and cities, especially those located near woodlands or rivers. History: Before Koneland existed, its lands were populated by Illicatishmen. Sometime in the distant past, before the City of the Frog King was destroyed so that the Hungry Sea might take its place, a previous incarnation of the Child With Many Names was born in nearby Lohth to an Illicatish family. His birth was such a powerful magickal event that it inadvertently led to the creation of lycanthropy, a magickal disease which transforms its sufferers into skinstealing wolfmen. This diseased manifested from the fears of humans. Something similar would occur millenia later just as the Child With Many Names was born again, and the Battle Over the Vyk occured on that Earth. This time, the more complicated fears of millions more people led nightflyers to begin carrying a magickal strain of influenza so contagious and so deadly that it would go on to kill 800 million people: Blush Plague. In cases where survivors were reinfected they would transform into combinations of 'hornmen,' or at least what people feared about them, and mythical vampyres. Both diseases still plague Koneland, unbeknownst to the outside world due to the careful work of the wolfmen to conceal themselves. Prior to vampyrism and Blush Plague, Koneland was born of nearwesterners (including Charcharon the Younger) settling on the great valley around the River Goreson. The river flowed down from the Vrankish Alps, and was rich in both ores and nutrients, which allowed it to make Koneland extremely fertile. This fertility, and material wealth brought the Konelanders into conflict with outsiders, including the Rainish Magickal Glory, descendants of the Ayish Kingdom like the Makebreki, the Postekri at the Kobey Desert's edge, and the Titalivavi Precursors, Toniks, the Last Kiluns, the Blue Empire of Sayerthenn, Reynlenn, the Coldlands, and the Anasic Empire. Near Vrankish territory, the Konelanders always respected their northern neighbors, and so never came into conflict into them. When the Vrankish people, Irrinisians, and Laandanisians were driven from their homes, the Konelanders offered them shelter, food, and a new homeland, and they gladly took it. This inadvertently led to an enormous population boom, and further loyalty to the City of Foe-Breakers, to the point that the Konelanders act as the city's buffer from the Toniks, and have gone so far as to aid them on raids of the Reyshi Kingdom. Very briefly, for less than five years, the City of Foe-Breakers was actually part of the unrecognized state known as the Grand Mastership of Goreynia, led by Lord Master Ulad Dragonson, who styled himself master after his childhood hero Billow the Slave and "lord" after his father Lord Ulad the Dragon. Dragonson was rumored to be a vampyre in life, before anyone knew for sure that they existed. Blush Plague, unfortunately, very nearly destroyed Koneland twice: once in the wake of the disease, which when combined with the ongoing Great War, left 80% of the nation's male population dead, and its female population not much better off, and again just forty years later when a new outbreak occurred just a day after the death of Dragonson. It is said that in cases wherein a survivor of blush plague was reinfected they had a nearly 100% chance of both entering and surviving the disease's last stage, which led to an outbreak of literal vampyrism in Parthalenn. Following the outbreak was the Konelander Civil War between the Reds and the Blacks. During the first outbreak, Billow jokingly referred to the Gores as "coneheads" upon meeting Ulad the Dragon, who wore a tall red and black conical helmet which he decorated with horns. At the time, the Dragon was merely the leader of the Smokegores. He, however, was later able to unify his nation under a single black & red banner using his Red & Black Army with leadership and combat skills that he learned whilst in the service of Billow. The Dragon and his generals fought alongside Billow, and greatly respected him. They later became some of the first few converts to the Faith o' Nine (which purports that Billow was an avatar of Canetol, one of the nine gods) in Koneland, and Ulad the Dragon made it the official faith of Koneland with his final words. Many years later, many of Dragonson's generals were the children of the Dragon's general, and were generally inexperienced when compared to their parents. After Dragonson's death they fell into two camps, the aforementioned Reds and Blacks. The Reds believed that the line of the Dragon was holy, and so their descendants should be made the Kings of Koneland, while the Blacks believed that Dragonson had committed some monstrous deeds during life (variously rumored as burning followers of the Faith of Anasia, crucifying infidels and political enemies en masse, slow beheadings, skinbrothering, wheelbreaking, and exposing them to the Hag) and so had made his line unholy. The Blacks, like the Reds, sought preserve a unified Koneland, and again like the Reds, were not too keen on Billow's ideas about "democracy," "taxes," and the abolition of serfdom. They believed that Koneland should be a decentralized state held together only by common law, and borders with the outside world. The Reds were led by King Elars, Uladimir Dragonson's nephew, and the Blacks were led by Countess Erza Doreynia. In the end, the Reds won the Civil War, but the Blacks prefered form of government came about. Koneland has since become more, and more populous, with a stronger folklore around vampyres, wolfmen, werespiders, weredevils, wytches, orcs, giants and giantsons, dragons, and wise beings beyond mere human understanding, who are without death, and can kill even immortals. The Truegores, who call themselves the Wise, worship these three beings, who they personify as three powerful wytches known as the Mæy (very positive word meaning "wytch") who are Mæ Igla (Needle), Mæ Predza ''(Yarn), and Mæ ''Kola (Wheel). They are without death, and can slay even immortals. A common saying is that the Mæy can make even gods bleed. These, of course, are personifications of Fate. Yarn is the future, the wheel is life, and the needle is death. Everyone has a needle. Relevant to Tale of Zul, Ross had heard a Konelander tale of these needles, and contacted the soul of Ross Hockson, who told him that his needle was in the hands of an unborn baby in the stomach of the Mother on Earth. Mæ Igla is said to wander the forests of the Vrankish Alps in a camel-shaped house made of needles. She is occasionally existent; this is entirely dependent on 10th's mood, as he is a finicky god. 10th once decided to imbue a random needle among Ketza's possession with Landeles' soul during the Storm of Storms. Ketza, Mate Tzu, and Tella are often called the Three Gorgons, which is no coincidence when paired with the idea of the three fates. Mate Tzu briefly channeled Igla, taking on the horrifying appearance of a snake monstress. This bestial appearance channeled together the fears of men, which ultimately are all its end; its fall, most likely at the hands of the Seasnakes, which prick things like a needle. In secret, the Konelander nobles have moved on from worshipping these things, or even Calthoss the Shadow & the Shine, but have come to worship an evil serpent they call the Fractal God, a being of breaks and cracks, of being broken, of trees and lightning, patterns, veins and black blood, of crackling fire, sigils and transmutation, glimpsed only in man's mathematicks and geometry, but always writhing, always seizing. They wish to ascend to a higher plane, almost literally, in that they believe that there is a higher dimension where magicks and maths are one, a place where they say Eternity can be comprehended. They are not wrong, but it is utterly beyond their reach, as they are chained to fate. This faith has become the dominant faith of Koneland by the time of ''Huron Space'', and indeed Konelander scientists are famed for their fervor, and seeming obsession with their jobs, which of course literally borders on fanaticism, and religious ecstasy. Category:States Category:Locations Category:History